On 8 September 2025 the Olender Ethnographic Park hosted an open-air event whose name translates roughly as "At the Olender Neighbours'." It set out to return to the roots, with a day of old trades, traditional flavours, and family warmth.
A word on the name. The Olędrzy were Dutch and Frisian settlers, many of them Mennonites, whom Polish landowners invited from the sixteenth century onward to drain and farm the marshy lowlands along the Vistula. They gave their name to a whole style of settlement, and to this park, which keeps the timber houses and the know-how of that vanished rural world.
The genuine article
A horse-drawn carriage passed us at the entrance, a fitting welcome to a place where the past sits close to the surface. The Olender Ethnographic Park keeps a cluster of original village buildings, and each one holds a story.
Forgotten trades, within arm's reach
Something was going on in every building, and none of it stayed behind glass. You could watch the old crafts, then try them.
At the wood-carver's bench you could see wooden spoons take shape under his hands. Years of practice showed in the work.
Kitchen traditions
The old ways of preparing food drew a crowd. You could watch sauerkraut being made, from tamping the cabbage down in the barrel to the workings of the ferment.
Cheese-making and butter-churning ran alongside, skills that were part of daily village life within living memory.
Learning by doing
Inside one cottage a guide talked about edible wild plants, the kind of knowledge that once kept families alive through a lean winter.
Out in the yard, an accordion and a fiddle played the tunes that used to open every village celebration.
Old games for children
The children had the run of the place. They walked on stilts and played the games their great-grandparents played.
Discoveries on a plate
The treat of the day was potatoes with oil and nigella seeds, served on a burdock leaf. A plain dish, cooked to an old recipe, and it tasted better for it.
You could also join the potato-digging and find out what autumn on a farm asked of a family, when everyone turned out to bring the crop home.
The Olender Ethnographic Park makes the case that tradition holds your attention when you get your hands on it. History here reaches all the senses.